Teen Who Hid Baby Not Prosecuted

SUFFOLK — A teen-ager who hid her baby beside her family's driveway after secretly giving birth will serve no time in jail.

Nancy G. Parr, the deputy to the Commonwealth's attorney, agreed not to prosecute an attempted-murder charge pending against 15-year-old Joanna Ricks.

The girl, however, was not granted immediate custody of her baby at her trial Tuesday.

She pleaded guilty to misdemeanor charges of abuse and neglect. Those charges originally had been felonies.

Juvenile and Domestic Relations Judge R.D. Hunter placed her on indeterminate probation and ordered her to continue getting counseling so she can learn to care for her baby.

Hunter placed the baby in the custdody of social services with the recommendation that the baby be put in the home of its 17-year-old father. He left open the possibility that the Ricks family could be reunited with the baby at a later date.

The girl rode away from the courthouse with tears in her eyes.

Her attorney, Johnnie E. Mizelle, said she wants to be reunited with the baby. He was confident the Ricks family would get custody of the baby and said that might occur within the next week.

"Being a mother has gradually dawned on her," Mizelle said. "She has visited the baby several times and she has gotten attached to the child."

But Teresa J. Bobbio, of the Department of Social Services, was more skeptical.

"They seem to be a real close-knit family and that's real important," Bobbio said. "But that's not the only thing the court was looking at today."

She said social workers still have reservations about the overcrowded and dilapidated house where the family lives.

Bobbio said the family would take a big step toward getting custody by improving their housing.

Plans to do just that apparently are already under way. Ethel Foster, the landlady of the family's house, signed an agreement with the city last week to bring the house up to minimum housing standards.

Yolanda Jones-Howell, a spokesman for the city, said the landlady has six months to finish the needed work on the house.

She said the work would be financed by community donations and Foster.

Mizelle said Jonas Ricks, the family's father, also has been looking for other houses.

Ricks called the police after two of his sons found the baby one July morning. He didn't realize the baby was his daughter's. He didn't know police would file charges against her. He never dreamed city inspectors would be called in at the recommendation of social workers and that the family's living arrangements would be put in jeopardy.

Mizelle said Ricks would never have called the authorities if he would have known all the repercussions that would occur.

Under Mizelle's advice, the family refused to comment on the proceedings.

Parr said the ruling "was in the best interest of everyone concerned."

In an interview she gave police, Joanna said she gave birth to the baby late at night in her room. She sneaked the baby outside the house about midnight and left it beside the driveway. She said she knew the baby could have died while it was left outside but never meant any harm to come to it.

She said she checked on the baby three times throughout the night and planned to give it to a friend in the morning.

Police found the baby wrapped up in a shirt with insects and afterbirth on it.

Some birthing matter came out of the baby's mouth when a police captain spanked it. Police said the umbilical cord had been cut but not tied. They found the placenta in a plastic bag in the back of a pickup truck.